Timothy Joseph, known to two generations of New York radio listeners as Buc Wild, has died at 47. His longtime partner Troi “Star” Torain announced it during a YouTube livestream on Wednesday, September 9, and Hot 97 confirmed the death. Joseph died Sunday, September 6, at the Pink Houses in Brooklyn. Star titled the episode a celebration of life and put his dates on it: January 3, 1979 to September 6, 2026.
Star mentioned fentanyl as a possible cause and immediately said he did not have confirmation. Nothing official has been released.
The relationship was not what most people thought it was. Star said the audience knew Joseph as his alleged half brother, but that he raised him, and he called the loss the passing of his son. He spent the stream moving between grief and the same biting humor he built a career on, poking fun at Tim the way he always had while making the point over and over that the man was loved and had a support system around him.
The story he told that hit hardest was about the lottery numbers. Joseph was dyslexic. Star said the two of them worked flash cards together at Hot 97, and that the recurring segment called Buc Wild’s Lottery Numbers, where Joseph read numbers on the air and sometimes read outdated ones, was designed to make him feel confident and comfortable and to keep it from ever looking like they were clowning him. A bit that ran for years and got laughs was, on the inside, a reading exercise built to protect him.
Star thanked Hot 97’s Tracy Claudy and Judy Ellis for looking out for Joseph, and said he stayed in contact with Joseph’s family and closest friends, especially during the stretches when Joseph became hard to reach.
The pair came up from public access television, moved to MTV, and landed at Hot 97, where Star and Buc Wild became one of the most talked about and most complained about morning shows in the country. The format they built was confrontational and personality driven, and it ran on the friction between two people who were not performing a partnership. Nearly everything that followed in shock oriented urban radio borrowed from what they did. They later worked together at other stations and on their own media projects.
Star said he had far more to say and ended the stream there.
